Stacking units

[chaos_incar]

Salutations!

Before I start, I would like to say that I have really enjoyed playing Wesnoth, and I hope that I can contribute. On that front, please note that I am proficient in C++ and I'm willing to write a patch if there is interest.

The idea basically involves allowing the stacking of units.

Q: Will this apply to all units or to those with some special ability?
A: All units.
R: In order for this to be useful strategically, it needs to be widespread. Also, this seems like a lot of work for something that won't see much play.

Q: How would this work.
A: Modify the game so that a unit can "attack" friendly units. When they do, they use up their attack and move into the hex of the "defending" unit. The attacking unit then "covers" the defending unit so that incoming attacks hit it instead of the one underneath.
R: There are three primary effects that I see.
1) You can bring high level units into play with less risk. This is especially useful for your commander.
2) Two units stuck by themselves have a better survivability. You can get 6 on 2 instead of 8 on 2.
3) You can save a near dead unit. This is the main reason for this suggestion. Maybe I'm stupid, but the only way I can think of for defending a unit against a high mobility unit is to surround it completely with 6 units. This would vastly improve the situation.

Q: Can you stack more than one piece above another?
A: No.
R: This suggestion is complicated enough. Triple-stacks will make it even worse while providing little benefit.

Q: Would this unbalance the game?
A: I hope not.
R: I have to admit that I am a very defensive player, and this option would suit my style (I am proposing it, after all). However, while I think it can draw out battles, I don't think it will alter the balance of the units. For the ability to defend, you are giving up an attack. This means that you can attack with shaman and have her guarded by a fighter, you lost an attack by the fighter. It actually may make more sense to put the shaman on top (provide cover and healing at the same time), but then she's exposed. You can put an archer on top of a horsemen to give it ranged cover. However, this means that you have to recruit twice as many units and give up ZOC. You can double a unit in a village to gain more healing, but healing amount can be reduced to compensate.

Q: How do you deal with the ambiguity where you click on a friendly piece next to a currently selected piece.
A: There should be a dialog box that allows the user to decide whether or not to to initiate a covering manuever.
R: It should be fairly uncommon for the user to click adjacent pieces. Defending another piece is significant enough to warrant a dialog.

Q: How would this be implemented?
A: I would suggest that the covered unit be temporarily taken off the map. When the covering unit moves or is killed, it should be returned back on the map. When it is the player's turn again, the covering piece is made the "active piece"
R: Wesnoth seems to expect that there is at most one unit in the hex. This gets around that problem.

Q: What happens if the active unit moves?
A: The stack is broken. The piece on the bottom is left in the hex.
Q: What happens if the active unit attacks without moving?
A: The unit underneath automatically covers. This should be noted in the attack dialog.
Q: What happens if the active unit does nothing?
A: It auto-covers the piece undeneath it at the end of the turn.
R: These seem to follow the KISS principal. The auto-cover ensures that you can't concentrate firepower by doubling up your units.

Q: Can you change which unit is active?
A: Yes, I would suggest that clicking the active unit a second time toggles which unit is active.
R: This allows for full flexibility. The alternative is to make the previously covered piece "active" and not allow a change. The previously covering unit auto-covers if it is still on the same hex as the active piece at the end of the turn. This might be a little less intuitive adn does not permit you to go from A covering B to A covering C without moving B. On the other hand, it is simpler to implement and provides fewer options.

Q: How should the UI indiciate that a unit is a part of a 2-unit stack?
A: I would suggest that only the top unit be displayed, perhaps with an extra ellipse to indicate a unit below. Clicking a tile with two units show both pictures with the stats of the covering piece, which is selected. A second click selects the bottom piece and swaps the stats. After an enemy hex loses focus, it always reverts to the image of the covering piece.
R: This fits with the existing UI and is fairly intuitive.

[turin]

Sorry, but KISS[1. ] This is an interesting idea, but, IMO, it makes the game way to complicated. And there is no real need for it- the strategy for the game is good as it is, nice and simple. We don't want to add more options that just make the game take longer to learn.


[1]: Keep It Simple Stupid.

[Dacyn]

1) You can bring high level units into play with less risk. This is especially useful for your commander.
2) Two units stuck by themselves have a better survivability. You can get 6 on 2 instead of 8 on 2.
3) You can save a near dead unit. This is the main reason for this suggestion.

are any of these good things?

Maybe I'm stupid, but the only way I can think of for defending a unit against a high mobility unit is to surround it completely with 6 units.

there is another way that only uses four units as long as the attacker is at least 3 hexes away and does not have skirmishing.

Q: Can you stack more than one piece above another?
A: No.
R: This suggestion is complicated enough. Triple-stacks will make it even worse while providing little benefit.

you could use triple-stacks to hide two wounded units.
and IMO not allowing triple-stacks makes it more complicated.

Q: How do you deal with the ambiguity where you click on a friendly piece next to a currently selected piece.
A: There should be a dialog box that allows the user to decide whether or not to to initiate a covering manuever.
R: It should be fairly uncommon for the user to click adjacent pieces. Defending another piece is significant enough to warrant a dialog.

I think you might be overestimating how uncommon this is; a player who selected units often could easily get annoyed. A better idea might be to have 'protect' as part of the right-click menu, along with a keyboard shortcut.

Q: Can you change which unit is active?
A: Yes, I would suggest that clicking the active unit a second time toggles which unit is active.

I don't think this should be allowed; it adds to the number of actions a player can do.

first of all, this idea sort of has a precedent, since units can move over allied units.
but I don't like it. The idea behind it is to make a way to defend units more easily, but if you are surrounded, then it should be hard to defend a unit. If you are not surrounded, you can usually defend with only 1 or 2 units. If a unit is wounded, then it seems counterintuitive that it can be protected by only a single unit.
and aura abilities are all based on the concept that the closest two units can get to each other is 1 hex away. If this were added, specialties based on units in the same tile would make more sense (of course, they would need to be more powerful).

[chaos_incar]

1) You can bring high level units into play with less risk. This is especially useful for your commander.
2) Two units stuck by themselves have a better survivability. You can get 6 on 2 instead of 8 on 2.
3) You can save a near dead unit. This is the main reason for this suggestion.

are any of these good things?

Probably only if you are me and don't like losing units, and I really only care about 3).

you could use triple-stacks to hide two wounded units.
and IMO not allowing triple-stacks makes it more complicated.

I'm actually pretty ambivalent about this. Being able to stack lots of wounded units together might be game-unbalancing, though...

I think you might be overestimating how uncommon this is; a player who selected units often could easily get annoyed. A better idea might be to have 'protect' as part of the right-click menu, along with a keyboard shortcut.

I think that this basically means that the suggestion won't fly. I was hoping that this would be simple enough to *barely* fit in with the existing framework. If we have to add new actions to the right menu, then I think we've gone way to far. (Currently, there is no unit action that requires a menu, and I would like to keep things that way.) Note that there is only ambiguity if you click on a unit that is adjacent to currently selected unit. Otherwise, we would simply selecting the new unit. This would be consistent with attack semantics (you can't specify a move and an attack in a single click.)

Q: Can you change which unit is active?
A: Yes, I would suggest that clicking the active unit a second time toggles which unit is active.

I don't think this should be allowed; it adds to the number of actions a player can do.

When I first though of this, I considered making the stacking fixed. However, I had some problems. It makes more sense for the "covering" piece to be made "active". However, this means that moving a stack while keeping the same piece covering the same other piece would be very difficult. You can make the bottom piece "active" when the player's turn comes around, but that introduces a non-intuitive switch.

but I don't like it. The idea behind it is to make a way to defend units more easily, but if you are surrounded, then it should be hard to defend a unit. If you are not surrounded, you can usually defend with only 1 or 2 units. If a unit is wounded, then it seems counterintuitive that it can be protected by only a single unit.

Isn't 4 units to protect one a little bit excessive? I guess I would settle for a solution where it takes 2 units to guarantee that one unit cannot be attacked. I thought of this after a case where I had 3 units around my wounded unit and the enemy (which was close) was able to run around and hit it from behind. Actually, it seems like what I should do is learn how to play more aggressively . I probably have to do that anyway, because I'm not leveling my units fast enough.

So, if there is interest, I'm still willing to code up a patch. However, it seems like this is too far a departure from the existing game to be incorporated. In that case, is there anything anyone wants to see programmed? I can't draw, but I'm ok with a compiler.

[turin]

4 units to protect one is definitely not excessive. In battle, do you think one, or even two units could stop the enemy from getting to a person who is wounded? another advantage of the current system is it forces you to use units in large groups, rather than sending them out 2-3 at a time. This is strategy; your suggestion would lower the thought involved in playing the game, and, IMO, make it worse.

Also, what about healing? If two units are stacked on a village, what happens? It is, IMO, obviously way too powerful for two units to get healing from one village on one turn. But, who gets the healing? Does anyone?

Protecting damaged units is supposed to be hard. We should not add a command and make the game more complicated; YOU should change your strategy so your units don't get as wounded, or so that you can accept the losses you get.

[telly]

I really hate unit stacking. Its not that hard to defend weak units using terrain and zone of control. Like turin says it would achieve both making the game more complicated and less intuitive to play while also at the same time removing a lot of the gameplay's depth and strategy.